War Child is seeking a highly motivated, organized and enthusiastic individual to assist the Corporate & Community Engagement department with their fundraising activities, with a primary focus on events, celebrity and corporate outreach and research. Taking direction from the Director of Corporate and Community Engagement, this individual will help to increase War Child Canada’s profile and assist with fundraising activities through events, and corporate and celebrity related partnerships. The ideal candidate is a post-secondary student with a professional attitude and strong interest in Event Planning and Management, Fundraising and the Arts.

About War Child Canada

War Child Canada is a registered Canadian charity based in Toronto. Working with war-affected communities to help children reclaim their childhood through access to education, opportunity and justice, War Child Canada also takes an active role in raising public awareness around the impact of war on communities and the shared responsibility to act. War Child Canada works in Afghanistan, Sudan, South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda and Jordan.

Some companies are replacing entry-level paid positions with unpaid internships.

Estimates suggest there are between 100,000 and 300,000 unpaid internships in Canada.

Under federal law, unpaid interns have no protections and are at risk of being exploited or abused.

THEREFORE we call upon Members of Parliament to support Bill C-636 The Intern Protection Act, which will extend workplace protections to all interns (paid or unpaid) under the federal labour code and set clear rules on the use of internships to prevent the exploitation of young Canadians.

ABOUT THE BILL

Under current federal law, many interns lack basic health and safety protections and have no limits on the numbers of hours they can be forced to work.

That’s why the NDP has introduced the Intern Protection Act.

The bill will extend health and safety protections to all interns, like the right to refuse dangerous work and freedom from sexual harassment and basic employment standards including right to time off and holidays.

Additionally the Intern Protection Act will introduce clear rules that will limit the use of unpaid internships and prevent the exploitation of young Canadians.

Students are graduating university with massive debts loads only to enter a job market where youth unemployment is nearly double the national rate. They deserve real action from the federal government to stop the ongoing misuse and abuse.

Tom Mulcair’s NDP is the only party pushing for tougher laws regulating unpaid internships.

Today the Canadian Intern Association received a letter from the Director of Employment Standards at the Ontario Ministry of Labour with information regarding their recent inspection blitzes.

The Canadian Intern Association would like to commend the Ministry of Labour to taking steps towards enforcing the laws surrounding internships in Ontario. We hope that other provinces will follow this example and that employers across Canada will be encouraged to comply with employment standards.

From April 1 to June 15, 2014, the Ministry of Labour conducted a proactive enforcement blitz in sectors known to hire a high proportion of interns. The purpose of the blitz was to promote compliance with the Employment Standards Act, 2000, as well as to educate employers and provide them with information materials.

The inspectors visited 56 employers in sectors such as advertising, public relations, computer systems design, consulting services, and information services and found:

8 employers had no internship programs

13 employers had internship positions that were all exempt

5 employers had internship positions with no contraventions.

17 employers did not have active internship programs at the time of the inspection

13 employers had internship positions with ESA contraventions

Based on the inspections, the inspectors issued 37 orders for compliance and to pay wages. A total of $48,543 was owed in unpaid wages, vacation pay, and public holiday pay. The inspectors also found violations for wage statements, record keeping, and hours of work.

Co-Op Student’s Death Highlights Gaps in Workplace Protections for Young Workers

Toronto – Last Friday, high school co-op student Adam Keunen died in a workplace accident in West Lincoln, Ontario. This is the third death of a student engaged in a workplace training program in Ontario over the past ten months. Members of the Canadian Intern Association and Students Against Unpaid Internship Scams extend our deepest condolences to the families and loved ones of these young workers. We also urge that every action be taken to ensure that tragedies like this are not repeated.

Over the past decade work-integrated learning has emerged as a key part of Ontario’s secondary and post-secondary education system. Currently, students engaged in unpaid work-integrated learning programs are not covered under the Occupational Health and Safety Act (OHSA) or the Employment Standards Act, 2000 (ESA). Additionally, students only receive protection under the Workplace Safety and Insurance Act (WSIA) under certain conditions.

These exclusions have real implications. As Amanda Moore reported in the Grimsby Lincoln News, the exclusion of co-op students from OHSA meant that it was the Niagara Regional Police that led the investigation into the workplace accident, rather than the Ministry of Labour, who normally investigates such incidents.

To close these loopholes, the Canadian Intern Association and Students Against Unpaid Internship Scams call upon the Ontario government to bring co-op students and interns under OHSA by passing Minister of Labour Kevin Flynn’s Stronger Workplaces for a Stronger Economy Act, and to grant them other basic workplace protections under the ESA by passing MPP Peggy Sattler’s Greater Protection for Interns and Vulnerable Workers Act.

More broadly, these tragic incidents necessitate that the Ontario government undertake a fulsome review of co-ops, academic internships and experiential learning programs to ensure the safety and well being of students and young workers is being protected. This type of review is not without precedence in Canada as the Government of Alberta launched a similar review in the wake of death of Andy Ferguson, who died while completing an academic internship at a radio station.

In the weeks ahead, both the Canadian Intern Association and Students Against Unpaid Internship Scams will be putting forward solutions that can improve workplace safety for students and give them critical protections while engaged in the school to work transition.